Lebensaft

This was for a continuing education fictional writing class I took a few years ago. The assignment was to write a "love scene"...

Once again, Tom Wilkes caught himself staring vacantly at his computer screen. He just couldn’t get her image out of his head. It had been three months since they’d started their forbidden affair. He must have been crazy, risking so much for the few precious hours they could steal away together. He also worried about the busybody across the street. Tom was certain she had seen him sneaking home at lunch, there was little on the block that she missed. If she should mention something to his wife… Tom would have a LOT of explaining to do. He felt trapped between two loves, like a roller coaster hurtling forward on an uncertain ride, filled with both fear and exhilaration.

Tom couldn’t explain the feelings he had for her, only that when they were together, she made his spirit soar. The 18th century chemists called it Lebenssaft or Vital Force. That missing element which they could not detect or analyze yet was the breath of life, distinguishing the animate from the inanimate. She was his Lebenssaft, his Vital Force, revitalizing his soul each time they were together.

Thinking back to their last “lunch” together, Tom felt again that thrum of excitement mixed with anticipation. He remembered their smells of sweat mixed with leather and her heat against his thighs. How her rhythm, responding to his tenderest touch, had leapt from a slow, steady throb to an explosive, almost frantic cadence. Her husky voice shifting from a throaty growl to a hungry cry, filled with ecstasy. Suddenly, they were engulfed in their own euphoria. Locked together as they soared as one. Each providing more than half to a sum that was more than whole.

“Wilkes! Wilkes, wake up!”

Tom snapped back to his own sweaty reflection, tattooed in screensaver.

“What the hell’s wrong with you? Save the daydreaming for your own time and get back to work!”